Investing in Space: The market’s taking off

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It’s that time of the year again, when CEOs take a deep breath, analysts ready their calculators, investors obsessively refresh stock tickers and every market open’s a potential rollercoaster: quarterly earnings.

It’s a quieter affair in the space sector, where some big names — like Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin — have so far steered clear of going public. There’s still a sound swathe of listed heavy hitters that (also) dabble in space activities and are likely to draw the eye, from Boeing and Lockheed Martin to Virgin Galactic. Voyager Technologies only just entered the public arena last month, with shares soaring more than 80% in company’s debut trading day after upsizing its initial public offering.

And then there’s the other new kid set to enter the Nasdaq’s block: rocket maker Firefly Aerospace’s filed to list and thereafter trade under the “FLY” ticker symbol. It’s yet to reveal the number of shares that’ll be made available and their price range, but the firm’s success in touching its Blue Ghost lunar lander down on the Moon earlier this year is likely to have earned it some attention.

The sector’s startups kept drawing in funds over the April-June stretch, riding the high of “sustained interest” in defense opportunities and improved market sentiment after a fleeting pause in the U.S.’ so-called reciprocal tariffs, according to a report from Seraphim Space covering industry activity in the second quarter. No big surprise on the security-linked gains: from intelligence gathering to imaging, communications and navigation, space is pretty integral to defense operations. It’s only stepped further the limelight this year between the U.S.’ plans for the Golden Dome missile-intercepting system, Europe’s “ReArm” initiative and NATO allies’ recent pledge to raise their defense contributions to 5% of their gross domestic product by 2035.

Altogether, investment in space startups rallied to $3.1 billion over the April-June stretch, marking the second largest quarter of investments in Seraphim Space’s records and a boost from around $2.1 billion over the January-March period. Not unpredictably, U.S. firms absorbed the lion’s share of the second-quarter space tech funding at $2.2 billion, or 70%. This means year-to-date investment in U.S. space businesses has already surpassed the total achieved in the whole of 2024 — impressively, despite federal contracts and NASA budget cuts and the volatility triggered by the recent U.S. administration’s protectionist trade policies.

Just two non-U.S. deals ranked in the second-quarter’s top 10 fundraisers — one by German launch services supplier Isar Aerospace in a $174 million Series C round, and another by Chinese positioning service provider Qianxun Spatial Intelligence, which clinched $137-million’s worth of Series B funds. U.S. startup Impulse Space meanwhile scored the top deal of the second quarter in a $300-million Series C raise.

Overall, venture capital companies remained the most active space investors in recent months, contributing 77% of 2025 funding in the sector to date, compared with the 54% average of 2024, according to Space Capital’s separate second-quarter Space IQ report. The company identified especially strong funding momentum for habitats — crewed space stations — as well as for on-orbit servicing and energy generation and storage. 

Noting 18 acquisitions that took place in the second quarter, Space Capital flagged it expects more than 10 “high-value” deals to close in 2025, for a projected total of $35 billion.

And space businesses are also carrying out investment. The talk of the town is a Wall Street Journal report that signals SpaceX has agreed to invest a whopping $2 billion in xAI — the maker of controversial chatbox Grok, which is already believed to be powering the customer support features of SpaceX’s satellite network Starlink. The space company’s investment in xAI is part of a broader $10 billion debt and equity fundraising effort previously announced by Morgan Stanley, the WSJ said, citing sources. CNBC has reached out to xAI and SpaceX for comment.

• Trump names Sean Duffy as interim NASA chief — U.S. President Donald Trump has directed Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to lead NASA on an interim basis. Back in May, the White House leader had pulled his nomination of tech billionaire Jared Isaacman to head the U.S. space agency. — CNN
• Macron says UK should boost space investment — Speaking to British lawmakers, French President Emmanuel Macron said Britain should increase its investments in space ventures, arguing that the U.K. could not stay on the sidelines of European affairs. — Advanced Television
• ESA books access to launch out of Guiana Space Centre to 2035 — The European Space Agency announced a deal with the French government to retain access for launches out of its official Spaceport in the French Guiana for the next decade. — Electronics Weekly
• Findings from Chang’e 6’s Moon samples unveiled — From volcanic and magnetic echoes to the lunar interior, check out some of the discoveries made following Chang’e 6’s return with a payload of first-ever physical samples from the far side of the Moon. — Orbital Today
• Scientists identify largest-ever black hole merger — Scientists have detected ripples signaling the violent collision of two vast black holes that circled each other then merged to form an immense black hole far beyond the edge of the Milky Way. — The Guardian

• Israel launches Dror 1 communications satellite — Israel Aerospace Industries’ Dror 1 national communications satellite headed into space aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9, successfully transmitting its first signals to the control station. — Defence Industry Europe
• China’s Landspace to launch its reusable rocket this year — Chinese private company Landspace is preparing to debut its reusable methane Zhuque-3 rocket in the fourth quarter, looking to clinch contracts for Chinese satellite launches thereafter. — Space.com  
• TiSpace rocket fails to deliver Japan’s first foreign launch — Taiwanese private firm TiSpace terminated the flight of its 12-meter hybrid-fueled VP01 rocket after liftoff, failing to see through the first foreign launch off Japanese soil. — Reuters

• SpaceX valuation to reach $400 billion in share sale — SpaceX is looking at fundraising and share sale plans that could propel the rocket maker’s valuation to around $400 billion, Bloomberg reports, citing sources. This would be the largest-ever valuation for a private U.S. company. — Bloomberg
• Varda clinches $187 million in funding to make drugs in space — Space startup Varda said it raised $187 million in a Series C funding round to carry on drugs manufacturing in space, with an eye to “support work on more complex molecules and ultimately increase cadence to achieve the turnaround times the pharmaceutical industry expects.” — CNBC
• Rocket maker Firefly Aerospace to IPO — Firefly Aerospace filed to go public on the Nasdaq and trade under the “FLY” ticker symbol, amid a broader revival in appetite for IPOs. — CNBC

• July 20 — SpaceX’s Falcon 9 to head off with Starlink satellites out of California.
• July 21 — SpaceX’s Falcon 9 to launch the O3b mPower 9-10 mission out of Florida.
• July 22 — Space X’s Falcon 9 to take off with NASA’s TRACERS mission out of California.